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Below, you will find lists of my favorite films of the year, divided by documentary (nonfiction) and narrative (fiction) formats. Not all the movies mentioned have received a significant release in 2018, though many of them did; the others may still be making the festival rounds, or may have only been released abroad, or only online (something evermore common, so almost not worth mentioning). Where I have previously written reviews of a movie (whether for Film Festival Todayor Hammer to Nail), the title of that movie is hyperlinked to my original review. In the case of the one film among my Top 20 choices which I did not review, I include a brief capsule description of it, here (and link to its distributor’s website). Where, in the “honorable mentions” section, I have not reviewed a film, I have hyperlinked the title to the movie’s IMDb page.

If there are films that you saw and loved this year which are not included in my list, then it is possible that either I did not see them, or liked them but not enough to include among my favorites. I also may have seen them and, well, not been any kind of fan. If you have questions about any omissions, feel free to comment and/or send me a note. What separates the “Top 10” from the “runners-up” (i.e., 11-20) is very little. If you’re in my Top 20, in other words, then I sincerely enjoyed you.

For anyone paying attention to the ratings (out of 4 stars) I gave at Film Festival Today(we do not rate films at Hammer to Nail), you may notice that it (rarely) doesn’t all add up: a (very) few films that I rated extremely high – let’s say 4 out of 4 – only end up, now, among my honorable mentions, whereas another with, perhaps, just 3½ stars, ends up among my Top 20. This happens because time is a great editor of opinion, and over the course of the year, some films may diminish in my estimation, while others may rise. Ready Player Oneis a terrific example of a movie that I loved when I saw it at SXSW (one risk of seeing a movie at a festival is that you may inadvertently rate the experience of watching a film in that environment over the quality of the actual work), but now think was a hell of a lot of fun, but just OK. I am not going to go back and change my original review rating, however.

Overall, it was an excellent year for both fiction and documentary films, especially if one looked outside mainstream commercial cinema, though there were big films I liked a lot, as well. I found much to admire in a variety of genres and styles. Anything that took chances with story, form and tone caught my eye, though it also had to synthesize its various elements into a cohesive cinematic tapestry, however odd the pattern. And so, time to list. Enjoy! At two later points, in January and/or February, I will publish other “best of 2018” lists, for acting and technical/artistic achievements.

Border(Ali Abbasi – Based on a short story by John Ajvide Lindqvist (who wrote the novel Let the Right One, itself turned into a great film), this film gives us a twisted fantasy where nothing is quite what it seems, and that’s all for the best. Protagonist Tina, with her scarred skin, beady eyes, excessive hair and bad teeth, is seen as an odd duck (or ugly duckling) by all, yet her ability to smell fear and discomfort makes her an ideal customs official. And then, one day, she meets a man just like her, and nothing is thereafter the same. Great performances and crazy plot twists make this a delightful arthouse horror-cum-fairytale-cum-thriller.

In addition to all of the above feature-length films, I’d like to also mention two short documentaries, one released by the UK newspaper The Guardian‘s documentary group, entitled Black Sheep(Ed Perkins), and the other as aNew York Times‘ Op-Doc, entitled Earthrise(Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee). The first is a profound examination of how one young man overcame the racism of his home town, while the second revisits the Apollo 8 mission. Both are beautifully assembled and phenomenal examples of the craft.

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Published by chrisreedfilm

Christopher Llewellyn Reed is a film critic, filmmaker, and educator. A member of the Washington DC Area Film Critics Association (WAFCA) and a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic, he is lead film critic at hammertonail.com, an online magazine devoted to independent cinema; a regular film critic here at filmfestivaltoday.com; the host of Dragon Digital Media’s award-winning "Reel Talk with Christopher Llewellyn Reed"; a film commentator for the "Roughly Speaking” podcast with Dan Rodricks at "The Baltimore Sun"; and the author of "Film Editing: Theory and Practice." In addition, he is one of three co-creators, along with Summre Garber of Slamdance and Bart Weiss of Dallas VideoFest, of "The Fog of Truth" (fogoftruth.com) – available on iTunes, SoundCloud and Stitcher – a podcast devoted to documentary cinema.
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